ABSTRACT

This book brings together scholars from a variety of disciplines to address critical perspectives on Chinese language social media, internationalizing the state of social media studies beyond the Anglophone paradigm. The collection focuses on the intersections between Chinese language social media and disability, celebrity, sexuality, interpersonal communication, charity, diaspora, public health, political activism and non-governmental organisations (NGOs). The book is not only rich in its theoretical perspectives but also in its methodologies. Contributors use both qualitative and quantitative methods to study Chinese social media and its social–cultural–political implications, such as case studies, in-depth interviews, participatory observations, discourse analysis, content analysis and data mining.

chapter 1|6 pages

Chinese Social Media Today

part I|68 pages

Chinese Social Media and the Public

chapter 3|20 pages

Social Media and Activism of Grassroots NGOs in China

A Case Study of Love Save Pneumoconiosis (LSP)

chapter 4|17 pages

The ‘Making’ of an Online Celebrity

A Case Study of Chinese Rural Gay Couple An Wei and Wu Yebin

chapter 5|16 pages

Populist Sentiments and Digital Ethos in the Social Media Space

Revelations of Weibo Celebrities in China

part II|42 pages

Chinese Social Media and (Re)Presentation

chapter 6|15 pages

Framing Food Safety Issues in China

The Negotiation between ‘Official Discourse’ in Newspapers and ‘Civil Discourse’ on Weibo

chapter 7|14 pages

Face-work on Social Media in China

The Presentation of Self on RenRen and Facebook

part III|43 pages

Chinese Social Media and Disability

chapter 9|11 pages

WeChat and the Voice Donor Campaign

An Example of ‘Doing Good’ on Social Media

chapter 11|17 pages

The Accessibility of Chinese Social Media Applications

A Heuristic Evaluation of the WeChat App

part IV|46 pages

Chinese Social Media in Greater China and Overseas

part V|30 pages

Chinese Social Media Critique

chapter 15|12 pages

Re-imagining Guangzhou on Sina Weibo

Geo-identity and Chinese Social Media

chapter 16|16 pages

The Decline of Sina Weibo

A Technological, Political and Market Analysis